Tag

dressing

Apple & Onion Stuffing: Technically It’s Dressing

I am continuing my week of Thanksgiving preparedness by sharing one of my all time favorite recipes. The first time I saw it was probably seven years ago on Rachael Ray’s Thanksgiving in 60 Special. The original is Apple and Onion Stuffin’ Muffins, but after making it over and over and over again, I have made a few alterations.

I made it this past weekend and doubled the recipe up for a little Autumn party I was having. I think everyone enjoyed it. While it isn’t real stuffing, it is technically dressing, I am pretty sure that this stuffed inside a turkey would be delicious!

 

Apple and Onion Stuffing
2 large sweet onions chopped
4 or 5 large ribs of celery chopped
2 large Honeycrisp Apple chopped
1 stick of unsalted butter
1 loaf Challah bread cubed
2 Tbs. ground poultry seasoning
32 oz Vegetable Stock
Salt and Pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a very large bowl toss poultry seasoning and cubed Challah and set aside.

Grease a 9 x 13 baking dish and set aside.

In a large skillet over medium heat, add butter. When butter is melted add onions, celery, apples, salt and pepper and cook until softened about 10-12 minutes. Stir occasionally. When the ingredients are softened add vegetable stock and bring to a simmer. Remove mixture from heat.

Pour the apple and onion mixture over the bread and toss until well coated. Put in the greased baking dish and bake for 20 to 30 minutes covered with foil. Remove foil and bake another 20 minutes until the stuffing seems set and the top is golden brown.

Enjoy!

For a printable version of this recipe Download HERE!

If you liked this recipe or for more Thanksgiving fun, here is last year’s recipe for Corn Bread Stuffing, my Williams and Sonoma Roast Turkey, or yesterday’s Thanksgiving placemats. Can you tell I like Thanksgiving?

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Gobble Gobble: Roasting a Turkey

I was more than a little stressed last week. While my sister usually hosts Thanksgiving, this year she asked if I would roast a turkey. Our family is getting bigger, and the kids are eating more, so this year we needed three turkeys to have sufficient leftovers for everyone.

I’m happy to announce, with a little help from Williams and Sonoma, America’s Test Kitchen, and memories of my Mom and Grandma Nano, my turkey turned out beautifully and tasted awesome, as did the stuffing.

 

I know that a lot of people buy frozen turkeys, but this year for some reason the fresh turkeys seemed to be reasonably priced so I went that route. If you want to try this recipe please make sure you thaw the turkey completely before the brining process. Another thing worth mentioning, treat your turkey and yourself with a lot of care. Wash hands and surfaces between steps to prevent cross contamination.

Turkey
1 – 20-25 lb turkey thawed
1 can Williams and Sonoma Dry Brine
1 stick of butter softened
1 tablespoon Poultry seasoning
Salt and Pepper to taste
1 jar Williams and Sonoma Pomegranate Citrus Glaze

Stuffing (makes enough to stuff turkey and have leftover dressing)
2 loaves of white sandwich bread cubed
2 sticks of butter
2 onions minced
4 or 5 stalks of celery finely chopped
2 to 5 cups low sodium chicken broth
2 tablespoons poultry seasoning

 

 

Day before Thanksgiving (24 hours before you want to begin roasting turkey), rinse turkey, remove insides and put into a large roasting pan. Generously sprinkle dry brine mixture on all sides of the turkey. Then gently rub into the skin. (This has the same effect as liquid brining but without the mess). Then cover completely with plastic wrap and return to refrigerator for at least 8 hours, but 24 hours is best.

 

The next day, mix together softened butter and poultry seasoning and set aside. Begin to prepare stuffing ingredients.

 

Next, in a large sauté pan over medium to medium high heat, add butter, onion, and celery and cook until onions and celery are soft and translucent. This should take about 10 minutes stirring occasionally. While onion mixture cooks, in a large bowl add cubed bread and toss with poultry seasoning, salt and pepper (I know it is weird to not add herbs to onion mixture, but this is how Grandma did it). Remove onion mixture from heat and let cool slightly.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

While stuffing mixture cools, remove turkey from refrigerator and rinse brine off thoroughly and place in a large roasting pan. Then gently lift skin and rub butter and poultry seasoning mixture between meat and skin.

Once the onion mixture is cooled, add to cubed bread and stir gently. Then slowly add chicken stock until the bread is just moist. You will probably not use all the chicken stock.

Using 1/3 to 1/2 of the stuffing mixture, loosely stuff turkey. Pour reserved stuffing into a casserole dish, cover with foil,  and put in oven for the last 35-40 minutes turkey is roasting in oven.

Tie turkey legs together with kitchen twine and put in the preheated oven for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes, reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees and generously brush with glaze. Cook until breast and leg temperature reaches 170-180 degrees on an instant read meat thermometer. This took about 4 1/2 hours for me.

Happy Holiday!

 

T-Minus 9 Days to T-Time: Cornbread Stuffing

Here’s what’s up people. We have less than 10 days til Turkey Time. I’m totally freaking out! Gallons of coffee, project planning, organizing, purging, cleaning, birthday party organizing, charity collection planning and all this is happening while I still take care of my regular day to day nonsense. Not to mention laundry, menu planning, shopping, toy picking up, milk spill cleanup, disciplining, homework, snuggle time, diaper changing/potty training, photo taking and blogging. Whew! As you can see, the boys are not affected by this craziness.

Why am I doing all this? Because I like to enjoy the holidays. I like to sit on the couch and watch 25 days of Christmas every night. I like seeing the “Giving Tree” at my church set up. I like to bake cookies with the kids. I like to fall asleep reading a book by the glow of the tree. I like having Christmas movie picnics in the living room. I like driving around looking at lights. I actually enjoy writing Christmas cards with Christmas tunes playing in the background. I like spending time with my gal pals and drinking Starbucks. I LOVE wrapping presents while the kids “sort” bows and ribbon. I enjoy cooking with whole sticks of butter like Paula Deen. I love when my family is together. I like that Brian has some time off at Christmas. I even love the shopping. The beautiful combination of Christmas music, warm winter coats (making you sweat), a shopping bag in my hand, Christmas decorations, people rushing, and the smell of department store perfume filling my nostrils just gets me giddy.

With all that said, this is the time of year that I usually go on a purge rampage and get my rear in gear and finish some projects that I have been meaning to do. The rule in this house is, before any decorations go up, the house has to begin at zero. As in, before we add anything we must delete. So, the past few days have been spent purging old clothes in Brian and I’s closet. I’m in the process of getting rid of all the kids clothes that are too small or have holes in the knees (why do boys always get holes in the knees of their pants?). I’m cleaning the basement so we can maybe start thinking of renovating down there in the new year. I reorganized the linen closet. I cleaned the garage. We took down the Halloween/Autumn decor. Brian cleaned out the shed. All old toys get donated. Also, I finish all the projects that have been started. Caroline even joined in on the shed cleaning.

Once all the old stuff is gone, we have room for the new. Once all the projects are done, we have room for Christmas. It is a very spiritually cleansing process. I started this tradition a few years ago. I have to say Brian and I never feel rushed during the holiday season. We just soak it in and enjoy it.

However, the week before Thanksgiving… well its insane around here. Are you in a T-Day frenzy right now? Do you have boxes all over the place? Did you donate all your family’s old clothes and toys to make room for everything new? Are you trying to get all you can done so you can watch all the Thanksgiving cooking specials on the Food Network this weekend? No? Just me, then.

Now that you have listened to my rambling (thank you for that, the stock people at Target are sick of my stories I think), I am going to share one of my favorite T-Day recipes.

Corn Bread Stuffing/Dressing

1 – 8 x 8 pan of Corn Bread crumbled (I bake my own using Jiffy brand corn bread mix)
1 stick unsalted butter
1 large or 2 medium sweet onions chopped
4 stalks celery chopped
1 quart low sodium chicken, vegetable, or turkey stock
1 Tbs poultry seasoning
1 dried Bay leaf
Salt and Pepper to taste.

Spray a 9 x 13 caserole dish with cooking spray and set aside.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

In a large pan over medium heat add 1 stick of butter and let melt completely. Next, add onions, celery and bay leaf stirring occasionally until the onions are soft and translucent. Then add poultry seasoning and salt and pepper and stir once more. Remove pan from heat to cool slightly.

In a large bowl mix together corn bread and onion mixture until well incorporated. Then, slowly drizzle in stock until corn bread is moist but not completely saturated (Note: I NEVER have used a whole quart of stock, but it varies how much stock you need depending on how dry the cornbread is).





Pour the whole mixture into the 9 x 13 pan and bake for about 20-30 minutes until top is golden brown and crispy.

Back to organizing and cleaning!